Woodcroft Neighbourhood Centre

After the former Community Centre was deliberately burnt down in 2015, the newly created City Architect’s Office took the opportunity to build a centre exemplifying its vision for community centres as places of lifelong-learning, well-being, recreation and culture. Ambitions for Woodcroft included increased capacity and flexibility of spaces and for its architecture to galvanise civic pride. The brief to Carter Williamson called for a robust, fire-proof building, flexible spaces for differentiating simultaneous groups, iconic design, a civic landmark within the residential area, greater connection to Woodcroft Lake & Parklands and a backdrop and facilities hub for the annual Woodcroft Festival.

Woodcroft Neighbourhood Centre is expressed in brick, concrete, timber and steel, crafted in various ways to be warm, textural and robust. Inside, the Centre works at different scales for the various groups using it, often simultaneously. Three core sections are gathered up under the signature serpentine roof, whose rise and fall reflects the different volumes of interior space: offices, an internal courtyard, community room, and main hall for 200 (with commercial kitchen), plus the tall central foyer and through-site link connecting them.

Woodcroft Neighbourhood Centre’s ushers in a new era of public centres designed to galvanise communities. Creating a magnetic, gregarious space that can be embraced by all, the centre is designed to be kind to neighbours, with storage facilities positioned as acoustic baffles along the walls closest to nearby homes. This allows Woodcroft Neighbourhood Centre to maintain its bold design and stature, which aids in its goal to galvanise and bring together local communities, whilst not negatively impacting surrounding residents. It’s clear Woodcroft Neighbourhood Centre has succeeded, already embraced by the local community, a contemporary icon of Woodcroft, loved by all.

The roofline can be read on many levels, as a continuous form enveloping the various spaces and activities of the Centre, or as an architectural gesture; It’s both. Its form is drawn from the internal program of rooms and spaces, the rise and fall of their differing volumes of space. Voids created by the undulating roofline are infilled with white opalescent polycarbonate that diffuses daylight and glows at night. Beyond core purpose, the Centre offers big gestures to its small community. Essential storage, plants and amenities are housed behind a concrete baffle, reducing noise for residential neighbours. This aligns to a covered veranda connecting street to lake, and the broad lake-front terrace. By night, the roofline is expressed by the warm white glow of its opalescent polycarbonate apron, tracing the serpentine line.